Thursday, June 23, 2016

History: The Year is 1814

Oh Dolley! Washington is Burning! -- The British burn Washington D.C. Dolley Madison saves that portrait of George Washington.

The Sun, the Universe and Everything -- The spectroscope can measure speed as well as substance.

In Other News -- Napoleon is banished to Elba, Star Spangled banner and the 80-hour work week.

Oh Dolley! Washington is Burning!

To say that the British are bitter over this little war with America
is an understatement. President Madison has lifted the embargo on
British goods, but the British don't care. They have blockaded the East
Coast so that American exports are down 90% from their pre-war numbers
and imports are down 75%. The British won't risk damage from the shore
batteries of major ports, so they are pummeling smaller ports into
rubble. On August 18th they bottle up American gun boats near the mouth
of the Patuxent River (pay-TUX-ent), and make their way over land
to Washington DC. It is a punishing march in the 100 degree heat of
summer. The troops are dropping like flies. They march through the night
to make up for lost time. The American forces have had weeks to
prepare, but they fail in their most important task. They have not
burned the bridges. President Madison almost blunders into the British
troops as they come over the Bladensburg Bridge. Meanwhile, Washington
residents are leaving in a panic. The First Lady, Dolley Madison, has
the presence of mind to save priceless historical treasures including
that famous portrait of George Washington. The British advance under a
flag of truce, but there is no one left in Washington to negotiate with,
so they set fire to the city. Washington D.C. is burning.
[1][2][3]

My Take by Alex ShruggedThe
gunboats gave the British a good fight and they held as long as any man
could expect, but it is clear that the American forces didn't believe
they would actually have to defend Washington DC. President Madison was
riding with the troops, but he was in his 60s, and he had been ill all
summer. The defense failed at the Bladensburg Bridge. It was a rout. It
is probably unfair to say that the American troops ran screaming like
little girls, but one witness wrote, "The young ladies were very merry
relating their attempt to fly on the supposed approach of the enemy to
their residence and that they were out run by the militia." The rout at
the bridge soon became known as the Bladensburg Races. The British said
that they set fire to the city in retaliation for the American's
deliberate and outrageous burning of Port Dover (Canada) a few months
prior. The burning of Port Dover was due to an out-of-control
lieutenant, and as bad as that was, the burning of Washington seems all
out of proportion. [4][5]

The Sun, the Universe and Everything

It may not seem like much, but without this discovery, one could not
measure the Universe. Joseph von Fraunhofer has invented the
spectroscope. This device allows him to view the spectrum of various
substances when they are made hot enough to give off light. He notices a
bright line within the spectrum of one substance. Then he uses his
spectroscope to view the light from the Sun and discovers 574 darkened
lines. (There are actually millions of these lines, but hey. He's just
getting started.) He wonders if there is a correspondence between the
bright line of his burning substances and the darkened lines in the
Sun's spectrum. As a matter of fact, there is. When a particular
substance is heated to the point of incandescence, the light it gives
off has a distinctive signature. Combinations of substances will give
off a more complicated signature but they can be untangled to the point
where one can determine what substances made that particular light. One
can determine the chemical makeup of a light across the room, or from
the Sun, or from the light of a star in the next galaxy.
[6]

My Take by Alex ShruggedSo
what? Well... when astronomers used this tool to analyze the light of
stars they noticed that some stars had completely unknown absorption
lines. Their signatures didn't match with any known substance. Then
someone noticed that the hydrogen line was out of place. It was shifted
toward the red part of the spectrum if a star was moving away, or it was
shifted toward the blue if it was coming toward us. This is known as
red-shifting and blue-shifting. How far the lines were shifted
determined how fast the star was moving. Some lines were shifted so far
that it was unbelievable! For a better analogy think of a train blowing
it's horn. As the train is coming toward you, the horn has a high pitch,
but as it goes by, the pitch drops and becomes lower. Something similar
happens to light. These absorption signatures allow scientists to
measure the speed of the expansion of the Universe and that is simply
amazing. [7]

In Other News

Emperor Napoleon abdicates and is banished to the island of Elba.
The forces of the 6th Coalition have pushed Napoleon all the way back
to France. He is forced to surrender his throne to King Louis the 18th.
Napoleon will face his Waterloo, next year. [2][8]

Francis Scott Key publishes the Star-Spangled Banner.
Actually it is a poem entitled, "The Defense of Fort McHenry". It is
about what he saw when he was held prisoner on a British ship as it
attacked the fort. The poem will become the lyrics of America's National
Anthem. [2]

The 80-Hour work week is established. A company
town schedule is considered humane: a 6-day work week, wake-up at 4:40
AM, 30-minute break for breakfast, 45-minute break for lunch. Much
better than slavery. Right? [9][2]